


the lights that stop me (turn to stone)

by ivermectin



Category: Gossip Girl (TV 2007)
Genre: Abusive Relationships (mentioned), Alcohol, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, Character Growth, Dan Humphrey is Not Gossip Girl, Dysfunctional Relationships, F/F, Gen, Infidelity (it's resolved soon), J for Waldorf arc!, Lesbian Jenny Humphrey, POV Jenny Humphrey, chuck/blair (mentioned), everyone is a disaster except Jenny and Eric, everything happens around Jenny, it's more serena friendly than dan friendly but it's complicated, no henry bass (sorry!), rated mature because it felt Heavy; no other reason, reclaimed use of the word 'bitch', this is NOT derena friendly, this is a character study of Jenny more than anything else, this is not a chair friendly fic either, well mostly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-12
Updated: 2021-02-12
Packaged: 2021-03-18 17:28:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29372361
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ivermectin/pseuds/ivermectin
Summary: Jenny's here mostly for Dan and Serena's wedding; all grown up and put together. The same can't really be said about everyone else, though.An exploration of what'd happen after the show but before the wedding - involving Jenny being a successful designer, Eric and Jenny being housemates and platonic life partners more or less, Jenny's partnership with Blair at Waldorf designs, Jenny and Serena becoming proper, real best friends, Jenny and Nate being each other's best bros, and Humphrey siblings being Humphrey siblings; as you do.
Relationships: Dan Humphrey & Jenny Humphrey, Dan Humphrey/Serena van der Woodsen, Jenny Humphrey & Eric van der Woodsen, Jenny Humphrey & Nate Archibald, Jenny Humphrey & Serena van der Woodsen, Jenny Humphrey/Blair Waldorf, Nate Archibald/Undisclosed(Spoiler)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 14





	the lights that stop me (turn to stone)

**Author's Note:**

> title from lights by ellie goulding, in part because it really fit the vibe (" _i had a heart then but the queen has been overthrown_ ") and in part because i listened to it on repeat while writing. this isn't solely blair/jenny (though there is lots of that, too); it's mostly centred on jenny & her relationships with the other characters, and also on jenny falling in love with blair all over again, this time as an adult, and it’s very different.
> 
> i'm very proud of this fic!! this is easily the longest i've ever worked on one piece of writing (that i've been able to finish!) in the past few years. hopefully you like it too :')

When Jenny was a girl all she wanted was to be the next Blair Waldorf. Fourteen and innocent, the baby of the Humphrey family, she learnt quickly that power meant crossing every single line ever drawn, showing that she had bite. With shaking hands, she did her make-up like goth meets punk meets bitch, because that’s who she wanted to be, a person who you’d have to reckon with. A young lady who’d flip you off and laugh, all magazine cut outs and glitter and laughter edged with the thrill of knowing something you didn’t know.

Jenny broke the rules, Jenny snuck out after dark, Jenny was no longer the baby of the Humphrey family, Jenny was a little bitch, Jenny was the devil in disguise, Jenny was the daughter her father had never wanted, Jenny was an average girl from Brooklyn, Jenny was possibly a lesbian, but Jenny didn’t want to be a lesbian, so she practiced her smiles in the mirror until she got them right, and she kissed Nate Archibald as many times as she could get away with. If she had Nate beside her, their arms linked, then she was safe, because he would protect her, he would get her out of trouble, he was a pushover and a sweetheart and a knight in shining armour because he never told Dan a thing.

And Jenny grew up bitter, Jenny grew up reckless, Jenny grew up like a child raised on venom, like someone whose hands were used to throwing knives, Jenny grew up pretending she was made of steel so that nobody would find out that she was really made of glass. And it worked, right until she was shattered.

*

Eric van der Woodsen is the first person Jenny talks to about liking girls like that _._ They’re both nineteen, and he’s in Hudson on vacation, a proper Sarah Lawrence boy and everything.

So Jenny says it, and she’s never said it before, and maybe Eric can tell, because his expression briefly flickers with surprise before he reaches for her and wraps her in a careful hug.

Eric doesn’t say _I wish you’d told me before, you know I know what you’ve been through,_ because Eric isn’t like that. Eric doesn’t say anything shocked, or anything rude. He thanks her for telling him, and then says, “You know, this makes a lot of sense.”

“Yeah?” Jenny asks, not looking directly at him. “How so?”

“You and I just clicked the moment we met,” Eric tells her. “Straight people don’t do that.”

 _Dan and Serena did,_ Jenny thinks, but she doesn’t say it, because she knows Dan isn’t straight, and she has her suspicions regarding Serena, but that’s neither here nor there. Anyway, she puts that out of mind; she doesn’t want the shadow of their siblings hanging over them.

“So,” Eric will ask her a little later, once he’s established that she wants to talk about it. “How did you know?”

“I always thought I wanted to _be_ Blair, you know,” Jenny says. Eric knows. He was there.

“You were obsessed with the monarchy, and with being queen, sure,” Eric says. And then he blinks, putting it together. “And with Blair Waldorf?”

Jenny groans, and puts her head in her hands. “I know, I _know._ The comphet crush on Nate was much smarter.”

Eric gives her one of his sardonic looks, but neither of them can remain serious after that; they both begin to laugh, and it’s strange, Jenny thinks, that she’s never felt as happy as she does when she’s just hanging out with Eric, and that she’ll probably never be as comfortable with anyone else.

*

When Jenny’s 23, she’s done the unthinkable; made it big as a designer, gotten her designs on the front page of all the right magazines, everything she dreamed of. She’s even mended bridges with Serena, in a long and complicated experience involving a bartender, an extra yellow dress, karaoke night, and taking a cab back home together. Jenny had drunk too much tequila, which always made her painfully honest and sincere (how does Dan live like this all the time, she wonders), and she’d told Serena a lot of things; Agnes things, Nate rescuing her things, Blair things.

And when they got back home, Serena in the dress Jenny managed to fix, looking like a buttercup, practically glowing, she’d told Jenny, warmly, “I feel like I’ve actually gotten to know you for the first time.”

“Congratulations on getting to know the only cool Humphrey,” Jenny had said, and Serena had laughed, engagement ring on her finger gleaming like cut glass.

“I’m marrying the wrong one,” she’d joked, and Jenny had smiled back, amused.

“Don’t let Dan hear that,” Jenny had said, faux-seriously. “He might resort to desperate measures, like pretending to be Gossip Girl again.”

Serena giggled. “What was that even about?”

“He was drunk, he thought it’d help you look at him in a different light,” Jenny shrugged. “Don’t worry, I chewed him out on Skype.”

“Oh, I wasn’t worried,” Serena had said. “Dan being Gossip Girl is like Nate running the Mafia. I need to drink something a lot stronger in order to see it.”

*

So, that’s how it goes. Jenny’s having the time of her life, more or less. She has good friends in Nate, Dan, Serena and Eric, as well as a few girls from college and a few colleagues who often invite her out for group drinks. It’s on one such night that Jenny’s surprised by none other than Blair Waldorf (Blair _Bass_?) gesturing to the seat next to Jenny. “Is this taken?”

Jenny doesn’t even look at her. “Yes, it is,” she says.

“Mm,” Blair says, quiet, and Jenny doesn’t look up even then, but she can hear her walk away, heels clacking against the floor. Her colleagues are looking at her, incredulous, and Jenny meets their expressions, equally confused.

“I didn’t expect that,” Jenny says. “We used to sort of be friends, in our time. I _wanted_ her here.” She gets up, moving out of her seat. “I’m going to go check on her.”

She finds Blair in the ladies’ room, re-doing her eyeshadow.

“I thought you’d sit next to me no matter what I said,” Jenny says, in lieu of a greeting. “The Blair I know doesn’t ask for things and wait when she really wants something.”

“The Blair you know is _dead,_ ” Blair says, some of the classic Queen B venom spilling into the end of the sentence. “Now, if you’ll move out of my way…”

Jenny looks at Blair; really looks at her. There’s a pinched look to her face, her sleeves go all the way up to her wrist, and while her wardrobe has always had a certain amount of colour and character to it, her outfit today is relatively bland for Blair; a simple red overcoat, and not even an interesting red; a dull maroon. There is, however, an indigo ribbon tying her hair back, as if she’s trying to keep up appearances in a minimal effort way.

Blair looks, in a word, tired. Maybe even sad.

Jenny’s a fashion designer. Jenny’s a lesbian. Jenny notices these things.

Jenny’s a bitch. “No,” she says. “I won’t move out of your way.” She reaches for Blair’s wrist, notices the smallest flinch on Blair’s face before her expression goes back to being neutral. She settles for holding her hand instead, and carefully leads her out of the bathroom. “You and I are going to roam the city,” she says. “We’re going to have fun.”

She doesn’t say, _What happened to you, does he hit you, Blair, come on, you used to know you were above all this, you should know you’re better than that._ Jenny may be a bitch, but she’s not soulless. She knows it’s never as easy as it looks like it is on the outside.

Blair frowns. “That sounds like something your brother would say,” she admits. She gives Jenny a thoughtful look. “I don’t think I’ve ever really thought of you as Dan’s little sister before.”

“That’s because between me and Dan, _I’m_ the one who comes with the warning sign,” Jenny laughs, leading Blair out of the bar. Her colleagues will deal. “You should know, Blair, you were around when I went radioactive.”

“Some would even say I was the catalyst,” Blair says, and once she would’ve said it in a way that would sting, but now it’s almost fond. “Where are we going?”

“I’m a pro at sneaking into fancy gardens,” Jenny tells her. “We are going everywhere.”

After a night of this, both of them are a little muddied up from the experience; Blair’s lost her indigo ribbon somewhere, Jenny’s hair has come out of its neat and tidy bun, and they both have mud on their knees, but Blair is smiling a little.

“J,” she says, and it fills Jenny with something warm, knowing that she’s grown up now, no longer a petite, little thing. “I need to ask you to do something for me.”

“You do know that I won’t necessarily say yes,” Jenny says.

“I wouldn’t expect you to,” Blair says. “Keep that spine. Spit in people’s faces.”

Jenny laughs, a loud and ugly but unguardedly happy thing. “ _Blair!_ ”

“Okay, don’t spit,” Blair allows. “But if this doesn’t work for you, I’m fine, no hard feelings.”

“What are you talking about?” Jenny asks.

“I’d like you to work with me,” Blair says. “Some sort of temporary collaboration. Just one time.”

“How do I know you won’t sabotage me?” Jenny asks. She doesn’t think Blair is that girl anymore, but one must check.

“The same way I know you won’t sabotage _me_ ,” Blair says. “We’re not in high school anymore. Neither of us is a queen, but both of us have power. You maybe more than me.”

Jenny says yes, of course. But Blair’s words stay with her long after they’ve gone their own ways. “Both of us have power, you maybe more than me. _”_

_Since when, Blair?_

Once, she would’ve revelled in such an implication of defeat, but now it just feels hollow. Even more surprising is the intensity of the urge Jenny has to investigate, how curious she is, how she wants to know.

*

Jenny and Blair weren’t ever really friends before, but maybe they can be now, Jenny reflects. She takes the job – Serena is supportive and enthusiastic, Dan is quiet but she can tell that he’s wary of it, Nate is supportive despite not knowing what’s going on, and Eric just smiles at her like he’s laughing at her, which makes Jenny smile back, as well.

“So,” Eric prompts, after her first day at the atelier as a temporary business partner.

“It was weird,” Jenny says, no preamble whatsoever. She smiles in Eric’s direction, but she’s not really looking at him. “Blair’s really mellowed out.”

“You know, some would say that’s a good thing,” Dan says from the doorway, walking in. Jenny huffs, even though she’s not _that_ pissed off – Dan and Eric are both the closest family she has, and it’s fine that they’re both there, even if a potential crush on Blair Bass isn’t something she wants to discuss with Dan, ever.

“No, I mean,” Jenny frowns, looks at Eric as if asking him to prompt her. “She just didn’t feel like Blair.”

There’s something wistful in the way Dan looks, just for a moment, but he blinks it away. “She’s really not holding anything against you?” he asks Jenny, serious and sombre in the way that he is. Jenny used to think he was overprotective, but she’d take Dan’s overprotectiveness over her dad’s extremely conditional care any day. “Jenny, we both know how she operates. This is Blair. She hates you, remember?”

“I know,” Jenny says, “but it feels like so long ago, now. We spoke about it, sort of. We’re putting the past behind us.”

Dan doesn’t look convinced, but he just gently pats her on the shoulder before he gets up and leaves. “I just don’t want you to get hurt again, that’s all.”

Once he’s gone, Eric raises an eyebrow, and Jenny says, quiet, “I’m worried about Blair.”

Eric doesn’t ask for more details, maybe sensing that Jenny’s conflicted about sharing. Then again, he wasn’t really like the rest of them; he’s never been that into gossip, at least, not when it directly hurts someone or betrays their trust.

“What do I do?” Jenny asks, looking at him, waiting.

Eric meets her eyes, hums under his breath in a way that is thoughtful. “You don’t interfere, Jenny. Whatever’s going on with Blair is none of your business. But if you really want to help her, just be there for her, as a friend. Let _her_ involve you.”

Jenny swallows, nods. “Okay,” she says. “That’s – I can do that, that’s okay.”

*

So Jenny doesn’t do anything, not really. She spends the days working with Blair, showing her what she can do with black lace and yellow satin, with maroon cashmere and dark shades of velvet. She does frills and jagged lines, exaggeratedly big buttons, little bow-ties and bits of silver embroidered into something dark and macabre, like a metaphor for herself. Sweet girl gone evil. It’s maudlin as a concept, but Jenny loves it.

Blair looks at her like she understands what Jenny’s doing with this, this odd venom themed angry-girl aesthetic glamorised and made elegant. She never asks though, and Jenny never says a thing, either.

Eric doesn’t ask either, but he does give Jenny a hug as she begins to clutter up their shared apartment with designs and sketches and bits and pieces of fabric, even pulling the sewing machine out. “I’m proud of you,” he tells her, and it might be weird if it were anybody else, but it’s Eric. He’s seen all the good and the bad, and believed in her anyway.

Dan sits down across her one day, looking at her designs.

“It’s good seeing you get back in the swing,” he says. “You seem happy.”

He asks for permission to look at her work, before he stares at her sketches. Then, he frowns. “Is this a metaphor?”

Jenny quirks an eyebrow up, looks at him. “What do you think?”

Dan squeezes her shoulder carefully. “I wish I’d understood what it was like for you, then.”

He’s staring into the distance, not looking at her. “Jenny,” he says, quietly, “Do you feel like I let you down?”

Jenny frowns. “No, I wouldn’t say that,” she says. “I feel like that about Dad sometimes, but never about you. You weren’t the best sibling, sure, but neither was I. Besides, you _tried._ Dad just gave up. You never did that.”

Dan nods.

“Is it that obvious?” Jenny asks him quietly.

“No,” Dan says, shaking his head. “It’s not. But you forget that I’m your brother. I’ve seen your earliest designs. I was there when you decided to go goth, or whatever that was. I can guess what this represents, because I was there for some of it.”

“Not all of it,” Jenny tells him. Then, glaring at him a little, she says, “Not enough of it.”

“I know,” Dan tells her. “I’m a bit of a bastard, aren’t I?”

Jenny smiles. “You’re my brother,” she says, punching his arm fondly. “Now, stop brooding in my studio, go brood somewhere else.”

*

One day, she finds herself staying late in the atelier, mostly because a dress that had looked perfect in her sketchbook looks wonky on the mannequin, and she can’t figure out what went wrong with it. She tweaks it, adds some lace, removes some lace, makes the neckline lower, makes the collar bigger, makes the sleeves asymmetrical, but no matter what she does, it looks off.

“Try a sash,” Blair’s voice says, as she makes her way up to Jenny.

Jenny frowns, considering. “Wait, no, not a sash, but something woven into the fabric where a sash would go,” she says, thinking aloud. “And the stitches should be visible. Sort of patchwork, but elegant. We need patterned fabric, like one of those scarves Serena likes to wear.”

“Hmm,” Blair says, considering. Then she gives an approving nod. “Not bad, J.”

Jenny smiles at her. Her phone pings with a message from Eric, asking when she’ll be home.

“It’s gotten pretty late, hasn’t it?” Blair says. It’s past nine thirty already, so, yes, it has gotten pretty late. “Have you had dinner yet?”

Jenny shakes her head. She’d forgotten, but it was more than that; she’d been so absorbed in dressing the fucking mannequin that it was a question that hadn’t even occurred to her.

“Come on, I’ve got stuff at hand,” Blair insists, taking Jenny’s wrist in one of her hands. She looks almost like her high school self, all carefully put together, but there’s something in the way she walks that makes her look like she’s trying to be invisible, to slip into the shadows.

Blair has a lot of stuff at hand. She opens a fridge (rich people, Jenny scoffs, but it’s a moot point, she’s rooming with Eric, and she’s successful enough that she _is_ rich people) and hands Jenny some posh bread, a slice of cherry pie, some salad with a lot of tomatoes and celery, a cup of strawberry yoghurt, and two yellow macaroons.

“Lemon,” Jenny says, picking up the macaroon. She’d mentioned that idly, once, something about college and a birthday party in which she’d grabbed a ton of lemon sweets, stuffed her pockets, and run away. “You remembered.”

Blair shrugs. Standing there, in the dim light of the kitchen, she looks like a marble statue; beautiful, irreparably sad, impossible to touch. It reminds Jenny of the first few times she’d seen Blair – Blair wasn’t like Serena, who was all warmth and kindness at first impression. Blair was a smile that didn’t reach her eyes, a sort of frigid anger that wasn’t directed at anyone in particular, and therefore hit everyone. Blair was more a myth than a girl.

But the person in front of her now is very much a real woman, and she looks small; small in a way that Jenny can understand.

“Are you hungry?” Jenny asks, taking a bite of the cherry pie. “Or, do you want something to drink?”

Blair gives Jenny an amused smile. It isn’t cruel or calculating the way it would’ve been when they were kids. “I’m fine Jenny, thanks.” Then, more to herself than to Jenny, she says, “You really are Dan’s sister, aren’t you.”

“Would Dan have plotted to steal the crown from you?” Jenny asks. “Yeah, didn’t think so.”

Blair laughs softly, and Jenny feels inexplicably proud of herself. “Remember when he pretended to be Gossip Girl just to get in with us? What was that about?”

“I don’t know,” Jenny says. “He was clearly going through something at the time, but being Dan, he wouldn’t have let anyone else help him. That’s just how he is.”

“Too stubborn to let anyone in,” Blair says, nodding. “Nate says it’s a thing he and I have in common.” And then she looks surprised, as if she hadn’t meant to say that aloud.

“Well, me more than either of you, sorry,” Jenny says. “Come on Blair, don’t give me that look. You’re looking at my designs, aren’t you? I know you’re clever. I know you know what they mean.”

Blair’s demeanour shifts into something less jovial and friendly, into something harsher. “Not all of us have the liberty of making our pain into art, Jenny.”

“Why not, Blair?” Jenny says. “Dan and I do it all the time.”

“Isn’t that part of the problem?” Blair asks, quiet. “Serena might like being with someone who’s always writing a story with her in it. I would never be able to live like that.”

“Well, lucky for you, all of my dresses are about how ruined I am, not about you,” Jenny says. She frowns, wondering at how the atmosphere has shifted into something so bitter and uncomfortable. “Why are we both acting like we’re in high school again?”

Blair just looks sad. “I don’t think I’m capable of moving past that,” she says. “Things just keep getting worse.”

Jenny inhales shakily. “Blair,” she says.

The moment shatters almost tangibly. Blair smiles, puts a hand on Jenny’s shoulder. None of it is genuine; all of it hurts.

“Let’s get you something to drink,” Blair insists. She opens a second fridge, and pulls out a vintage bottle of wine, handing it to Jenny without even looking at the label. “Now, it’s time for you to be off. Goodbye, Little Humphrey!”

Jenny doesn’t say bye; she just lifts her middle finger and walks off. But she swears she hears Blair snicker, so it’s fine.

*

She doesn’t go home. She goes to Nate’s.

“Jenny, what a surprise!” he says, wrapping her in his arms and swinging her around.

“Careful, I’m holding a wine,” she says, but she’s laughing, cradling the bottle against her chest like it’s a child while Nate swings her in circles.

“You don’t have anyone around, do you?” Jenny asks.

“Nope,” Nate says. “So, what brings you here? Everything’s fine, right? Is Dan okay?”

“He’s fine,” Jenny says, shrugging, putting the wine bottle down on Nate’s coffee table, slumping over on his sofa. “He’s _Dan_. He’s brooding a bit, I don’t know. How’re you?”

“I’m okay,” he tells her. “I like being a lacrosse instructor. It’s a fun job.”

“No girlfriends?” Jenny asks him.

“Wow, what is this, a press conference?” Nate asks. “Were _you_ Gossip Girl?”

“Nate, I was twelve when she started posting. I’m flattered that you think I’m that conniving, but _really_.”

Nate smiles, rolling his eyes. “Hey, stop that. If anyone could run GG at the age of twelve, it would’ve been you.”

Jenny laughs despite herself. “Ok, I did have a question for you,” she tells him. “Could I sleep over? We need to have a Wii tennis competition. For old time’s sake.”

“Oh, you’re _on_ ,” Nate says.

Jenny quickly texts Eric a “spending the night at nates, will xplain later, lov u.”

Eric responds with “sounds het but ok. love u too,” and Jenny smiles before putting her phone away.

So they play Wii sports for an hour. Jenny beats Nate at tennis, but he wins at golf. And once that’s over, he gets out soda from the fridge, of all things, and they sit on the floor and drink from the bottle like kids having a sleepover night.

“What’s wrong?” Nate asks, finally. “I know something’s bothering you, you’re sort of twitchy.”

Jenny shifts, crosses her legs, uncrosses them. Things would’ve been so easy if she’d actually had a crush on Nate.

“I’m worried about Blair,” she tells him. And his expression smoothens out, and he looks at her, clearly thinking over something.

“Me too,” he says. “Tell me what’s going on.”

“She’s just really… toned down,” Jenny says. “And no, it’s not in a she’s grown up way. The Blair I knew wasn’t afraid of anything. She wanted to take up space, to be noticed. I don’t think she’s like that anymore.”

Nate nods, meeting Jenny’s eyes. “I know what you mean.”

“And you haven’t done anything to help?” Jenny looks at him, insistent. They both know what’s going on, and they both know that they know.

“What can I do?” Nate looks upset, but Jenny knows it’s not directed at her. “You may have noticed I’m no longer friends with Chuck. It was a mess, Jenny. I told him to back off, and he just laughed in my face. And then he went back home, and I don’t know what he did, but Blair spoke to me later to tell me that he’d been more cruel than usual, that night.”

Jenny took a shaky breath in. “And Blair really thinks she belongs with him?”

“He’s always been telling her that,” Nate says, looking at the ceiling. “And when we were kids, we encouraged him, you know? I thought it was a good thing, that Chuck was getting serious about a girl, wanting to settle down. I didn’t know he was… like this.”

“Surely you knew that he treated women badly,” Jenny says softly.

“I just looked the other way when I was younger,” Nate admits. “I’m not proud of it. Besides, I wasn’t sure how much of it was real, and how much of it was just him exaggerating.”

“Most of it was probably true,” Jenny says. She stares at the ceiling. “Hey, do you think we could smoke something?”

Nate smiles. “I should’ve known you were here for my weed.”

“Well, duh,” Jenny says. “Did you think I was here for _you_?”

Nate’s smile goes bitter. “Nobody ever is.”

“Whoa, no, none of that on my watch,” Jenny says, giving Nate a quick hug. “I get enough maudlin bullshit from Dan as it is. I don’t need you adding to it.”

“Yes Ma’am,” Nate says solemnly, and gives her a little smile. “I’ll get the weed?”

“Yes please,” Jenny says, yawning.

When Nate comes back, a pre-rolled joint in his hand, Jenny takes it from him, lights it expertly, puts her feet on his coffee table and watches him. She’s always known better than most people, that Nate Archibald gets lonely in a way that’s always right under his skin, a way that he would never voluntarily express, thanks to his upbringing.

“Hey,” she says, softly. “Lots of people love you, Nate. We might not be the best at showing it, but it’s true.”

Nate just nods, expression sort of empty. Jenny gives him the joint, and gets her phone out, texting Eric, “i think im suddenly everyones therapist.”

“took u long enough,” Eric’s response says. “this is just what being gay is, jenny. solving everyone elses problems.”

Jenny rolls her eyes, sends him a quick “fuck u” followed by a ton of heart emojis.

She doesn’t know what she would’ve done without Eric. And as she looks at Nate, who’s exhaling smoke and looking sad, she can’t help but think that he needs someone like that too.

 _Dan could help,_ she thinks, but she can’t say that to Nate. She’ll ask Dan to go check on him later, maybe. Dan understands loneliness in a way that Jenny is barely acquainted with; he marinates in it, sometimes. Jenny would never do that. Jenny never voluntarily stays in positions that make her feel less than. Not like it’s gotten her that far.

“Enough moping,” she says to Nate. “I’m going to take you to a club, and find you a cute girl, and you’re going to get laid.”

Nate laughs like that’s the funniest thing he’s ever heard.

“Not gonna happen, Jenny,” he says, and he sounds sad. “I’m not a Bon Jovi song. My heart isn’t an open highway. I can’t just be with anyone, not when I feel like this.”

“Unrequited crushes suck ass,” Jenny says. She wonders if it’s Serena; it makes sense for it to be her. Still, she knows better than to ask. “Let me know if there’s anything I can do for you, okay?”

“Okay,” Nate says. He gets up, and gets out a Just Dance disc. “How about we start with this?”

*

Jenny focuses on work. She plays chess online when she can’t sleep at night, and reads psychology textbooks to study and try to understand the patterns of abusive relationships in general. Her line of designs is almost over, and with its completion, her professional relationship with Blair also comes to an end.

Jenny isn’t really sure if Blair Bass is her friend. Sometimes, they hang out after work, sharing something to drink (Blair is a green tea enthusiast, and Jenny still remembers that phase during high school when Dan drank excessive amounts of chamomile tea – he might’ve stopped, but it’s impacted her for life.) At times like this, it’s easy for them to talk, and Blair doesn’t tiptoe away from the truth. She admits that things she’d done were terrible.

Jenny can tell that Blair isn’t that person anymore; it’s in the way she works, how she has price ranges that are affordable, and fashion programs explicitly for aspiring designers who can’t buy their way into the fashion world. She does her best to create inclusive designs, and culturally sensitive designs, and she has a diverse and passionate staff working for her. For what is maybe the first time in her life, Blair tells Jenny once, she is loved, not feared, and she likes it a lot better.

Jenny likes it too. She likes being at Blair’s atelier, likes how when a song from 2007 plays on the radio, Blair lip-syncs to it and makes eye contact with Jenny, encouraging her to join, she likes how sometimes she gets Blair coffees, and sometimes Blair returns the favour. She likes discussing fashion with Blair, and discussing current affairs and politics and feminism. Blair, for once, seems to actually value and respect Jenny’s opinions, professional and personal, and Jenny lets the lines blur.

She puts her guard down entirely. At a charity gala, looking at the artificial smile on Blair’s fact that doesn’t reach her eyes, and the iron grip on her arm Chuck has, accompanied by a smile that makes Jenny uneasy, she realises she’s fucked. Dan’s busy discussing his upcoming book with someone, and Eric is flirting with a cute cater waiter – there’s a context there, Jenny knows – they already know each other through mutual friends, so it’s not weird, and nobody’s really paying attention to her as she sneaks over to the bathrooms to cry. Or so she thinks.

She stands by the sink, feeling something that’s a combination of shame and fear, because she knows, in the pit of her stomach, that Blair isn’t safe with Chuck, she knows that there’s nothing she can do, and she knows also, without a doubt, thanks to the bitter shot of envy in her gut, that she’s irreversibly and irreparably in love with Blair Waldorf. Blair Bass. Whatever.

The door swings open, though, and Serena enters. “Hey,” she says, quiet. “Saw you make your leave, you looked a little shaken. Everything okay?”

Jenny weighs her options. She wants to talk to Serena about this, but she knows that things between Serena and Blair are complicated at best, which is to say nothing about things between Serena and Chuck, which is a topic she knows there’s more to than there appears, but she’s never really prodded at.

“I don’t know,” Jenny says, quietly.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Serena asks.

“No,” Jenny says. “But thank you.”

Serena gives her a smile, the sort of reassuring, beautiful supermodel smile that comes so easy to her. Jenny doesn’t resent her for it anymore. Aesthetics be damned, Serena’s so wonderfully sincere. It’s why she and Dan used to be so good together in high school, even if Jenny hadn’t wanted to admit it at the time. And it’s why now, she thinks Dan grew up differently from Serena, grew even more introverted than he’d always been, but better at hiding it, and she isn’t sure what they are to each other anymore, except engaged, which is why she asks, “What about you?”

“What about me?” Serena repeats, expression quizzical.

“Are you okay?” Jenny asks. “I know people out there talk about you like you’re Dan’s future trophy wife, which sucks, frankly. You deserve better. You’re more than that.”

Serena gives Jenny a little smile. “You’re really sweet,” she says. “No, to be honest, it’s Blair?”

“Oh?” Jenny asks.

“She’s really hard to talk to, these days,” Serena says. “She’s so distant with me on the phone, and she responds to text messages monosyllabically. When I saw her giving her speech today, it felt like I was watching a stranger. I don’t know, Jenny, do you think I’m a bad friend? Do you think I did anything wrong?”

Jenny blinks. “I think you’re a great friend,” she says, and she means it. “Maybe Blair has something going on. All you can do is wait for her to come to you. She knows she can always come to you. Right?”

“Yeah,” Serena says, after a moment of quiet contemplation. “Yes, you’re right.” She pulls out lipgloss from her handbag, begins to reapply hers while looking in the mirror, but first, she hands Jenny a handkerchief with the van der Woodsen crest embroidered on it. She doesn’t say anything about the crying, and Jenny is grateful.

“Hm, so you and Eric really do have the same handkerchiefs,” Jenny says, once she’s done wiping her eyes. “Are you going to give them up when you marry Dan?”

“It hasn’t come up yet,” Serena says, smiling. In retrospect, Jenny will think that out of all Serena’s smiles, that smile was the least genuine, but she’s too distracted to really think about it at that particular point in time.

“So,” Serena goes on to say. “Do you want to get out of here? I’ll text Dan, you text Eric? We’ll do a girls night out?”

“Yeah,” Jenny says, smiling. “It’s not like they’ll miss us, anyway.”

*

Jenny’s right, nothing really happens and they aren’t majorly missed by anyone, having sent texts before running away. It cements whatever her friendship with Serena had been; they’re like proper sisters-in-law now.

Jenny still spends time hanging out with Nate as well. She’s more and more certain that he’s in love with Serena, based on how he goes all sad and quiet when she talks about the upcoming wedding. It’s like a curtain falling – Nate probably thinks he’s being discreet, but Jenny can practically see the light going out of his expression when she brings it up, so she stops bringing it up around him as much as she can.

She finishes her last “J for Waldorf” design, as well. It’s been five and a half months, and Blair gives her a hug as she leaves the atelier, no longer an employee or collaborator there.

“Don’t be a stranger, Blair,” Jenny says.

Blair doesn’t say anything in response, but she does give Jenny a little smile. It might just be Jenny’s imagination, but Blair looks a little sad.

*

Jenny spends a month not doing anything solid. She goes home with different girls every night, practically camps out at Nate’s place because he’s a bro in a different way from Eric, and it’s somehow easier to be sad around Nate than it is around anyone else. Possibly because he’s also sad, and he’s also pining.

Though that’s not entirely fair to Eric, who’s the only person who knows the extent to which Jenny’s feelings for Blair really run, and does everything he can to be supportive of Jenny, which often includes buying her lemon cupcakes with pink sprinkles and taking her to cat shelters over the weekend.

Things between Dan and Serena are more and more strained as the wedding date gets closer and closer. Jenny and Eric don’t talk about it, but she knows he’s thinking the same thing she is – if the thought of getting married is stressful enough that even the joy of married life can’t mitigate the stress, is it really worth getting married?

They’re Dan and Serena though, so everyone who’s picked up on the tension hopes that they can resolve it before the wedding. Jenny lets herself believe this too, and focuses on spending more time with Nate, who’s getting more and more dejected as the wedding date comes closer.

“If it upsets you so much, maybe you should talk to her,” Jenny suggests once.

“Talking to her isn’t going to solve anything, Jen,” he says, and it’s weird, only Dan has ever called her Jen, but it’s nice coming from Nate.

Then, one day, when she’s still hanging out at Nate’s house, and they’re gaming together, Jenny in a shirt that says GAYMER and has a rainbow on it, Nate in a tank top that’s frayed but looks comfortable, someone knocks on the door.

Nate and Jenny exchange a look – Nate tells her that he’s not expecting anyone, and she can’t for the life of her think of who’d be visiting him without calling ahead.

When Nate opens the door, it’s Blair standing there on the other side. She’s not wearing any makeup, and her hair is clearly unbrushed. Her coat, as well, is from the last season.

She doesn’t even spare Jenny a glance, she just walks up to Nate and he hugs her, holding her carefully in his arms, like she’s made of glass.

“Nate,” she says. “I need your help.”

“Do you want me to leave?” Jenny asks.

She’s hoping the answer will be no; she really wants to stay. But she’s out of luck. Blair gives her an apologetic look, nods.

“I’ll talk to you later, J,” she says.

“Okay,” Jenny says, but she doesn’t really believe it. “Take care of yourself, Blair.” 

*

Jenny doesn’t hear from Blair for a week, and she’s too busy conspiring with Eric over avoiding marriage planning to pay close attention. Things between Dan and Serena are strange to say the least **—** Dan is now overdoing marriage planning with meticulous detail, as if his life depends on it, and Serena seems to have run out of fucks to give, showing up at cake tastings and wine samplings already drunk, just nodding along to everything Dan says and saying “yeah”, though both Jenny and Eric can tell that she hasn’t even been listening.

Nate doesn’t mention it again, and Blair doesn’t show up at Nate’s again, so Jenny takes matters into her own hands eventually, and calls Blair.

“Blair Bass speaking,” Blair says, as she picks up. “To whom do I owe the pleasure?”

Jenny frowns. This is overly formal, which makes no sense, unless - “Is Chuck with you right now?”

“Yes, how urgent is this?” Blair says, her tone still clipped and formal. “I’m sure you could’ve just bothered one of my junior employees instead of me. I have a secretary, I’m not made of time.”

“Meet me tonight at Nate’s,” Jenny says. And then, for good measure, she adds, “Please.”

“That is acceptable,” Blair says. “Now. Goodbye!”

She hangs up.

Jenny walks over to the instant coffee machine. No sooner than she’s poured out a cup for herself does Dan show up, though, walking down the corridor with frantic energy, holding a clipboard.

“What’s the hurry, my good man?” Jenny calls as he walks by.

“Floral emergency,” Dan says.

He looks ready to run, but Jenny puts her arm out to stop him. “Wait,” she tells him. “I’ve barely seen you all week. Wasn’t all of this organised, like, months ago?”

“Yes, but I’ve got to double check. There’s just three weeks left, everything’s got to be perfect, and if things go wrong closer to the day, we can’t fix it,” Dan says.

 _You’re distracting yourself,_ Jenny wants to tell him. _I’m your sister, I know how you operate. I know you’re doing all this because it stops you from thinking about whatever it is that’s really bothering you. But what is it that’s really bothering you?_

She isn’t equipped to open that box, but she tries anyway. “Everything else is alright though, right?”

“Yeah, absolutely, why wouldn’t it be,” Dan says, giving her the fakest smile she’s ever seen. “Now. I must dash, but I’ll see you.”

“Break a leg,” Jenny says, patting his shoulder, watching him go and sipping at her coffee.

Things could be worse in her life, she reckons. At least she’s not Dan. She loves her brother, but his problems right now make hers seem trivial, like all she has to do is strike a match to get fire, while Dan is still rubbing two pebbles together.

*

Blair’s already at Nate’s when Jenny gets there. Nate, however, is nowhere to be seen.

“I told Serena to distract him,” Blair tells Jenny.

“Is that smart?” Jenny asks. “I feel like the wedding being so close in the vicinity, it might just depress him.”

Blair rolls her eyes, scoffs. “Pfft, Serena out to have fun never depresses anybody, least of all Nate. It’ll be fine, don’t worry about them.”

“I’m worried about _you_ ,” Jenny says.

“You don’t need to be,” Blair says, serious. “I was talking to Serena and Nate about Chuck, and just, you know, about life in general.”

She’s quiet for a moment, and then she says, “Chuck wants me all to himself. Like a princess in a snowglobe. Contained. He wants us to be each other’s whole entire worlds. When I was younger, I thought that was romantic. Now, I only feel trapped.”

“You’re powerful without him,” Jenny says. She itches to touch Blair, to put a hand on her knee, an arm around her shoulder, but she doesn’t. “You’re enough on your own, Blair.”

“I’m only powerful because I step on the people around me to get anywhere,” Blair says, bitter. “You of all people know that. I hurt you when we were younger. I sent you away. My power comes from taking people around me down. I’ve never managed any other way.”

“You didn’t send me away, I wanted to leave,” Jenny says. “I didn’t like who I was becoming in the city. Do you think I wouldn’t have stayed in Manhattan if I wanted to? I needed to go, to find myself without you and your clique watching me all the time. But I thought we’d put all of that in the past. You’ve apologised to me before, and you’ve made amends. You don’t run Waldorf Designs like a bully. I don’t understand, don’t you see how much you’ve grown? Don’t you feel proud of how far you’ve come?”

“How far _have_ I come?” Blair asks. “I’m Blair Bass _._ It’s like my future was sealed when I was seventeen.”

Jenny frowns. “Come on, that’s not true,” she says. “You’re still Blair. You don’t give control to anyone. You’re strong enough to leave him.”

Blair swallows, looks away. “Things are different, Jenny. But I told you I’ve been talking to Nate and Serena. I need perspective, and allies.”

“You know I’m your ally,” Jenny points out.

Blair almost smiles. “I do,” she says.

“I’m glad you came to see me today,” Jenny says.

“I’m glad you asked,” Blair replies.

They’re both quiet for a while, just sitting on Nate’s couch, neither saying a thing to break the silence. And then Blair says, “I know I blamed you for Chuck’s misbehaviour, and I’m sorry.”

 _Misbehaviour_ , Jenny wants to repeat, raising an eyebrow, but instead, she says, “I think it’s easier for you to do that. To blame other people, so that you don’t have to hold Chuck accountable. When we were younger, there were so many people around you that you could blame. But that’s not the world we’re in any longer.”

“No, it’s not,” Blair agrees. She gives Jenny a thoughtful look. “You think I’m blaming myself because it’s easier than blaming Chuck, right now.”

“I didn’t say that,” Jenny says, but she’s smiling.

“No, but you were thinking it,” Blair says, and she’s right, Jenny had been, but she wasn’t going to say it. “You’re not wrong, J,” Blair says, and she’s smiling a little, too. “It’s easy being with someone who’s familiar to you. Someone who’s seen you at your worst, but still loves you. I wanted that, and I thought I had it. And when it began to go wrong, well, whose fault could it possibly have been?”

“We both know that it isn’t you,” Jenny says. “And you can leave him, can’t you?”

“Thank you for being my friend,” Blair says to Jenny, and she gets up, and she’s ready to leave, maybe.

“I’m happy to,” Jenny says. “I like the person you are, now.”

“I like who I can be around you,” Blair says, giving Jenny a soft smile. And then she leaves.

*

When there are two and a half weeks left before the wedding, Nate texts Jenny and asks her if she wants to hang out. Which isn’t that strange, so she responds with a yes, and goes to his place.

They get high pretty fast, and end up on the floor. Jenny’s sitting, leaning against the wall, her legs stretched out, and Nate’s lying down, using her lap as a pillow.

“If only one Humphrey sibling would turn out gay,” Nate says, and it sounds sad, “did it have to be you?”

Jenny goes through a series of emotions very rapidly; she’s incredulous, confused, shocked, horrified, and finally, very angry. Nate is supposed to be better than this. He’s one of her best friends, after all.

She smacks his arm, hard. “What the fuck, Nate? I’m perfectly fine as a lesbian, and that’s a really fucked up thing to tell a gay person. You can’t say shit like that. I thought we were friends.”

“Jenny,” Nate says, almost pleading.

She isn’t listening though, she pushes Nate off her lap, grabs her coat, marches over to the door.

“Jenny, wait, fuck, I worded it wrong,” Nate says.

Jenny turns, at the door, ready to open it and leave and not come back. He’s Nate. He’s the one heterosexual man she’s supposed to trust to not want to fuck her. He knows she’s gay. He’s always been nothing but supportive. Which is why the betrayal hurts, but also why she gives him a chance to explain.

“How could you possibly word that right?” Jenny asks, upset. “Why do you want me to be heterosexual? Do you know how much it hurt to hear that?”

“I didn’t mean to say that,” Nate says. He sounds truly sorry, so Jenny waits for him to go on. “I don’t want you to be heterosexual, Jenny. I’m glad you’re who you are, and comfortable with it, and proud of it, and all of that.”

 _Then why did you say what you just did_ , Jenny’s about to ask, but she runs over the sentence in her head again. Humphrey siblings. One of them. Gay. So if it’s not her he was talking about **—**

“You’re talking about Dan,” she says, quiet. A lot of things are falling into place now. Why Nate is so upset about the wedding. Why Blair didn’t think being around Serena would hurt Nate. It had never been about Serena at all. “You’re in love with my brother.”

Nate nods. He looks sad.

“It really wasn’t about me,” Jenny says. “Why did you word it like that?”

“I don’t know, I was thinking about Serena and Eric, I think. And that’s where the ‘only one gay sibling’ thought came from. You know I’ve always felt like you’re perfect as you are, I didn’t mean it,” Nate says.

His apology sounds genuine, and he looks so miserable that Jenny forgives him immediately.

She drops her handbag, wraps her arms around him, giving him a hug.

“I wish you’d told me this before,” Jenny says. “All this while, I thought you were in love with Serena.”

Nate doesn’t respond audibly, but he hugs her back.

Jenny moves from him, gets his coat from where he’s hung it on the stand, takes his house keys off the hook. “Come on, let’s go to a cafe, get some doughnuts, celebrate.”

“Celebrate what, my unreciprocated feelings for a straight boy?” Nate asks, but he takes his coat, and he lets Jenny take his hand and pull him outside, and lock his apartment.

“Well, yeah,” Jenny says, putting the keys in Nate’s pocket. The world feels a bit different now, knowing what she knows. “Unreciprocated feelings for a friend is totally a part of the package deal. But mostly also, just your coming out to me. Am I the only person who knows?”

Nate shakes his head. “I told Blair. Well, she guessed.”

“And what did she say?” Jenny keeps her voice neutral.

“She told me I have abysmal taste in men,” Nate says. “Which makes no sense, because Dan is her ex-boyfriend, and I told her that, and she said, _temporary lapse of judgement,_ but it was fine. She was just joking, anyway.”

“Yeah, I think that’s Dan and Blair’s friendship for you,” Jenny says with a shrug. “She used to send him really mean postcards. I think they’re on the fridge at his and Serena’s place.”

Nate chuckles at that.

They get the doughnuts.

Jenny doesn’t interrogate any further, not wanting to push, but Nate opens up, talks about how his feelings for Dan had just crept up on him, how he didn’t know when or how it happened but he’d just woken up one day deeply in love with him and unsure of when it had even started. It’s clear that he’s been wanting to talk about this for a while, now.

One thing leads to another, and he tells her more things, all the time he’d spent chasing women who were never right for him (“Oh, god, what a mood, except for me it was with men, _obviously,_ ” Jenny tells him. And then she says, “remember when I was your girlfriend?” and they both laugh), how other than Serena, he isn’t sure if he’s ever actually felt anything beyond aesthetic appreciation for a woman before, how he still isn’t sure if he’s gay or bisexual, how he’d had a crush on Chuck when he was younger, and how he’d had a brief summer fling with Carter Baizen a few years ago.

Jenny listens, and they eat a whole box of doughnuts together.

“I always thought you were too nice to be a cishet guy,” she tells Nate before they part ways, her going back to her place with Eric, Nate going back home.

Nate just smiles at her almost cheekily. It’s a pretty standard smile, but the look in his eyes is mischievous.

She waves goodbye, gets into the taxi. It’s strange how nothing has changed at all, but at the same time, _everything_ has.

*

Two weeks before the wedding, Blair calls Jenny.

“I’m doing it,” she says, the moment Jenny picks up and says hi.

“Uh, doing what?” Jenny asks, not daring to hope. “Getting a tattoo on your ass?”

“Is being distasteful a trait genetic to Humphreys, or did something happen during you and your brother’s childhood?” Blair asks, but it doesn’t even sound like she’s trying to be mean. She sounds like she’s trying not to laugh. “Jenny, I’m divorcing Chuck.”

“Oh my god! Blair, I’m so happy for you, congratulations!” Jenny says, smiling. “Are you holding up okay?”

“Cyrus _is_ a lawyer,” Blair says. “And well, after the Louis spectacle, I made sure to get a solid pre-nup, even though I trusted Chuck with my whole heart. So I reckon I’ll be fine.”

“We’ve _got_ to celebrate with drinks,” Jenny says.

So, they do. They go to a lesbian bar, which Blair suggests, and Jenny’s too hopeful to turn it down, but she’s also trying to be realistic, trying not to feel like she has a chance when she really does not. It turns out that her hope isn’t misguided, though; Blair kisses her barely a drink in, still sober.

“I didn’t misinterpret this, did I?” she asks, pulling away suddenly. Her lipstick is a little smudged, and Jenny revels in it.

“No, you didn’t,” Jenny says. She kisses Blair this time, and they buy two cute fruity little drinks, and then they leave.

Blair books a room at a nearby hotel, with confident ease. Jenny ties her hair in her best topknot, wonders how many times she can make Blair come in one night.

They don’t spend as much time having sex as she’d expected, though. Jenny manages to get Blair off twice, with her fingers once, and with her mouth, the second time, and then Blair returns the favour, and then they get room service and watch ANTM while eating ice-cream. Neither of them is really paying much attention to the show, though – it’s just that nothing else is running.

“You ever thought about this?” Blair asks.

“Oh, all the time,” Jenny says, smiling wistfully. “When you said I was your queen, before you graduated… I don’t think anything any boy ever said to me made my heart beat like that.”

“It only means what you make out of it, Jenny,” Blair says, turning the TV off. “You’re the best person when you’re your own person. Can I ask you something, and will you answer me honestly?”

Jenny raises an eyebrow curiously, but she nods.

“Calling you Jenny makes me feel like I’m in Constance again,” Blair says.

“Blair, it’s my name,” Jenny says, but she’s grinning, because it’s funny. “Would you rather call me Jennifer?”

“Calling you J feels even worse,” Blair goes on, ignoring that. “Like Little J without the little, and I feel like we’re so past that.”

“Yeah,” Jenny says. “That’s fair.”

“So, I have to ask,” Blair says, reclining on the pillows, stretching her arms out. “Can I call you Jen?”

“Only Dan and Nate call me that,” Jenny says, thoughtfully. “But… yeah, if you want to, I don’t see why not.”

“I could call you Tallulah,” Blair contemplates.

“Shut up, nobody calls me Tallulah,” Jenny says, and then she laughs, snorting unattractively. “By that logic, I’m calling you Cornelia.”

“Sounds like a Victorian lesbian romance,” Blair muses. “Cornelia Waldorf and Tallulah Humphrey.”

“Tallulah was my _grandmother_ ,” Jenny says, bumping her shoulder against Blair’s. “But you’re right, the names have the right tone.” Drily, she adds, “Such a pity I’m not a writer.”

“Designing clothes is sexier than writing books, anyway,” Blair points out. “Don’t tell Dan.”

“Pfft,” Jenny says, and they exchange a look, and they both burst into laughter again.

“Are we _sure_ nothing else is on?” Blair asks, turning the TV on again, swapping channels around. They watch some golf, one of the few other things that is on. They get bored very quickly, and find other ways to entertain themselves, before falling asleep together, their arms around each other, and their legs intertwined.

When Jenny wakes up, she has a strand of Blair’s hair in her mouth. She moves it away, and then smirks.

She wakes Blair up, and kisses her cheek.

“So, what now?”

“Nothing now,” Blair says. “Something after my divorce, and after Dan and Serena’s wedding.”

“I don’t have a good feeling about that wedding,” Jenny admits.

“Me neither,” Blair says. “But hey, you and I put a new spin on high school. Maybe Dan and Serena can do the same.”

Jenny highly doubts it. But she shrugs, gives Blair a little smile.

She hopes so too, for Dan and Serena’s sake.

*

One week before the wedding is due to happen, Jenny realises that she was right to doubt it. She and Eric enter Dan and Serena’s apartment, take-out bags in their hands, and they put them down on the coffee table.

“Hey, Dan!” Jenny yells. “You better be decent, Eric and I are back!”

Eric gives Jenny a look, and Jenny shrugs innocently, and it would be normal except –

“ _DANIEL RANDOLF HUMPHREY_ , I CAN’T FUCKING BELIEVE YOU.”

Eric’s expression changes rapidly, shifting from shock to concern back to shock and back to concern.

“YOU DIDN’T SEE HIM, SERENA!”

“You’re engaged to me! We’re getting married this week! YOU WEREN’T SUPPOSED TO SPEND THE WEEKEND FUCKING SOMEONE ELSE –”

Jenny and Eric run into the room, and enter just in time to see Serena taking her engagement ring off and throwing it at Dan. It hits him in the chest.

“Serena,” he tries again. “I didn’t – I’m sorry – ”

“I should’ve realised,” Serena says, something broken in the tone of it, “that you’d just sleep with _anyone_ who made you feel needed, huh, Dan?”

“That’s rich coming from you,” Dan spits.

“Okay, okay, that’s enough,” Jenny says, putting an arm around Serena. Eric steps in between Serena and Dan, looking at Jenny, looking at Dan, and looking at Serena.

“Cool down, everybody,” Jenny says.

“ _Jenny_ ,” Serena begins, the emotion not fully diluted yet. She sounds upset, and angry, and somehow brittle, so Jenny says, “Hey. I’m here, you can tell me all about it,” and carefully leads Serena out of the room. She can see Eric walk up to Dan, saying something carefully while Dan stares into the distance, looking incredibly lost.

Eric will take care of her brother. Jenny will take care of his sister. Jenny and Eric have got this.

“Come on,” Jenny says, softly. “We can get ice-cream, or we can get drinks, whatever you want, and you can tell me what my loser of a brother did that has you _this_ upset.”

She leads Serena to the car, gets in quickly.

“I appreciate that, Jenny, but I don’t want to go anywhere,” Serena says. Her voice is shaky, and she puts her head in her hands. “I just want to sit somewhere quiet, and cry.”

“I’ll drive you somewhere quiet,” Jenny says. “I promise I can drive properly. Eric may not believe it, but it’s true.”

Serena giggles, but it comes out a little choked.

*

Jenny does as she’s said she would, driving them out somewhere quiet, pretending she can’t hear Serena’s soft crying in the passenger seat. She stops for a moment at a turn, asks, “Do you want to go to Nate’s? He always makes you feel better, right?”

“ _No_ ,” Serena says, and it has an edge to it that’s so uncharacteristic of Serena’s gentleness and perpetual warmth that Jenny can tell something’s wrong, something involving Nate.

Jenny frowns, but doesn’t push, which is the right choice, because Serena says, “Nate’s not an option. I don’t think seeing him will make me feel much better right now, given that he and Dan spent the weekend _fucking._ ” And then, she puts her face in her hands, and makes a choked noise.

“Sorry,” she says. “God, Jenny, I’m so sorry. You don’t want to hear about Dan’s sex life.”

“Serena, you’re my friend,” Jenny says, quietly, pulling over on the side of the road. “If my brother’s being an asshole to you, I want to know.”

Serena exhales deeply. “It just makes me feel like,” she frowns, staring at the traffic, “like, I’m not enough, you know? I knew he didn’t love me, Jenny. I knew that. I think I just thought we could go back, you know? To being seventeen and madly in love. Nobody’s ever looked at me the way Dan did, the way he used to. I think I just wanted…”

“It’s okay,” Jenny says, softly. “You haven’t done anything wrong.”

“I think I knew, all along, that this was one last shot in the dark,” Serena says, so soft that it’s barely audible.

“You wanted to be with someone who loved you wholly and completely,” Jenny says, quietly. “Serena, Dan isn’t your only choice. You know that, right? It’s okay if the dream is dead. You need to find somewhere else to live.”

“That’s one hell of a line,” Serena says. She’s not crying anymore, though her eyes are still suspiciously liquid.

“It’s true,” Jenny says. “Dan doesn’t have to be your happy ending. Don’t let him be your limit.”

Serena just looks at Jenny for a moment, before nodding.

“How do you feel?” Jenny asks, quietly.

“Weird, shaken, and confused about how I _should_ feel,” Serena admits. After a second, she adds, “I don’t mind if Dan’s not my husband, like, I think that hurts less than it should, which makes me feel guilty. Pity you’re not my sister-in-law though.”

“I really am the best Humphrey,” Jenny jokes.

She’s rewarded for her efforts with a beaming smile from Serena. “You really are. Hey, Jen, could we go shopping? Or see a movie? Turn this into a girls’ day out, not think about Dan or Nate?”

“Yes,” Jenny says. Something occurs to her then, and she asks, cautiously, “Do you want me to call Blair?”

Serena gives her a thoughtful look.

“Not just yet,” she says, finally. “I want to spend the day with you. And I want to know _why_ you blushed when you said her name.”

 _Fuck,_ Jenny thinks. But she just says, “Can’t a girl have some secrets?” and gives Serena a little smile.

“Fine, be like that,” Serena says. “But don’t come crying to me when you aren’t sure what to get her for Valentines’ day.”

Jenny laughs, and pulls the car back on the road, driving them both to the nearest mall.

*

They go to watch a movie, and everything adult looks too angsty, so Jenny gets them tickets for a lighthearted kids movie.

“We can do your hair next,” Jenny suggests. “I’ve heard it helps, you know. Just dye it an entirely different colour, like, a pastel blue or something.”

Serena frowns, thinking. “I’ve always wondered what it’d be like to be a redhead.”

When the film begins, Jenny excuses herself for a moment for the bathroom, squeezing Serena’s shoulder on the way out. She does not go to the bathroom, instead, drops Eric a quick text asking for status updates on Dan.

Turns out her brother is doing his best to getting blackout drunk. Great.

Eric messages again, saying he’s doing his best to ensure Dan stays hydrated and does _not_ get that drunk. This is why they swapped siblings, Jenny thinks. She would’ve just smacked Dan in the face with a pillow and told him off. She might still do that, actually, once they get home.

Updates on Dan acquired, she calls Nate immediately.

“Jenny, hi,” Nate says.

“Don’t hi me, you fucker,” Jenny says. “What made you think it was a good idea to sleep with Dan _now_? Serena’s been one of your best friends from childhood, doesn’t that mean anything?”

Nate sighs. “I didn’t – Jen, I was just so sad, and he was being so, so nice.”

“Method acting for Homewrecker by Marina & the Diamonds now, are we?” Jenny asks.

“I deserve that,” Nate says. He sounds miserable, Jenny notes. “If it helps, I’ve been feeling incredibly _Starring Role_ for a while now.”

Jenny’s familiar with that song, and familiar enough with how Nate’s been feeling to know how it applies. She feels deeply sorry for him. Jenny knows Nate, and understands him well enough that she can’t really ever stay angry with him for long.

“I know you have,” Jenny says, a little more gently. “I hate seeing you sad, Nate, you know that. I love you, and I want you to be happy. But you can’t just screw over Serena in order for that.”

“I love you too,” Nate says. Jenny suspects he’s on the verge of tears. “I just… I was so sad. And I told Dan, and he gave me a hug, and he asked me why I feel so unlovable, and I told him a little about how all my past sexual experiences have always been unfulfilling, and in most cases I was just taken advantage of, and other than Serena and Vanessa, I don’t think I’ve ever had sex with someone who was a friend, just a friend, and his arms were around me, and he was right there, and he was looking at me like it meant something, and…”

“Nate,” Jenny says, carefully.

“I know,” Nate says. “Jenny, I know.”

“I need to go,” Jenny says. “I’m with Serena right now. Take care of yourself, okay?”

“You’re too kind to me, Jen,” Nate says.

“Yeah, well, I wasn’t always like this,” Jenny points out. “You gave me a second chance, and we both know that’s important. I’m not going to condemn you for fucking up. I want you to be happy. I don’t know why there’s so many obstacles in your way.”

Nate laughs, but it sounds a little choked up.

“Talk to Blair, or something,” Jenny says. “I really do need to go now.”

“Speaking of Blair, and of you,” Nate says. “Is there anything you want to tell me?”

“So not the time, Archibald,” Jenny says, but she grins.

She hangs up on him, and makes her way back to the film.

“Twenty minutes is a long time to take a bathroom break,” Serena says. “You alright?”

She looks a little better already, Jenny notes.

“Don’t be pissed off, but I called Nate and gave him a piece of my mind,” Jenny says, taking Serena’s hand.

“Why would I be pissed off by that?” Serena looks adorably confused. “You know you didn’t have to, right?”

“Nate’s my friend, too, and I don’t really want to enable my friends’ bullshit,” Jenny says. “Especially not when they’re hurting my best friend.”

“I’m your best friend?” Serena’s eyes go wide.

“Don’t tell Eric,” Jenny says. 

“Well, at least I’m up there on that list,” Serena giggles.

And then a few parents shush them, and Jenny and Serena exchange a look, before bursting into laughter that they muffle expertly with their hands.

After the movie, Serena decides against dyeing her hair red, but says that she’ll come back to do it at some point. She does go and get a septum piercing though, as well as two ear piercings at the tip of her earlobe.

“You look gorgeous,” Jenny says, leading Serena out. “You think I should do anything?”

They leave in the evening, lugging little bags full of extra French fries and a bonus burger for the road, Jenny’s hair dyed lavender at the ends, tiny new tattoos done on a whim – Serena had gotten angel wings, and Jenny’d gotten a needle and thread, both on their inner wrists.

The only other tattoo Jenny has is the semi-colon behind her left ear. Eric had a matching one; they’d gone together to get those, too.

It’s, all things considered, all bullshit aside, a reasonably good day.

As they’re turning into Dan and Serena’s drive, Serena says, “Time to face the music, huh?”

Jenny shakes her head. “I want some time alone with Dan, if that’s okay? You take Eric, go to our place. We’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Okay,” Serena says, softly.

“I love you,” Jenny tells her, leaning forward, kissing Serena’s forehead. “Don’t forget that.”

Serena smiles, and her eyes seem to be welling up with tears again. “You too, Jen. Thanks for today.”

Jenny nods, getting her phone out and calling Eric as she steps out of the car.

He’s there in a minute, and she tells him the new plan, which he nods at. He gets into the car, at the driver’s seat, and Jenny watches as Serena gets out a pack of fries, and begins to feed him carefully as he drives away.

*

Once they’re gone, she goes back into the house, where Dan’s sitting on the sofa, his posture defensive.

Jenny feels a mixture of emotions. Concern for her brother, worry. Just the need to comfort him, to tell him that he can move past this. But also, anger and rage, which are winning out right now. Jenny loves her brother; that’s why she wants him to do better, that’s why she expects him to do better.

“Serena told me what happened,” Jenny says, quietly but firmly. “I can’t believe you would do this.” 

“It’s none of your business, Jen,” Dan says, not looking at her, his mouth a thin line.

“It _is_ , actually,” she shoots back. “Serena and Nate are my friends too, Dan.”

Dan looks at her then, his expression unreadable. “So you’re taking Serena’s side,” he says, bitter.

“No,” Jenny says. “It’s not about taking sides, Dan. What you did really hurt her.”

“I know,” Dan says, and there is remorse in his tone. “I didn’t mean to hurt her, and I know that I did, and I feel awful about it.”

“Why, then?” Jenny asks, quiet. “Why did you do it?”

“You should’ve seen Nate,” Dan says, still sad. “He was so unhappy. I just wanted to make him feel better. I didn’t know any other way to. It felt like, no matter what I did, somebody would get hurt, but I couldn’t leave Nate like that.”

“And Serena?”

Dan doesn’t say anything, which is a confession in itself.

“Dan, listen,” Jenny says. “I’m saying this to you because I’m your sister and I love you and I know I give you a hard time sometimes, but I really want you to be happy. I think if, a week before your wedding to Serena, you sleep with Nate, and you’re more worried about Nate than you are about Serena, to the extent that Serena’s well-being is an afterthought to you, maybe you shouldn’t be marrying Serena.”

Dan looks at her, and then looks away. He doesn’t say anything for a moment, and then he says, softly, “Serena is my best friend.”

 _Nate is also your best friend_ , Jenny thinks. Instead, she says, “So that means you have to marry her? You know that being someone’s best friend doesn’t equal being in love with them, right?”

“Yes, Jenny, I know,” Dan says. He sounds defeated.

“I just don’t understand,” Jenny says, but she says it a little more gently. “If you know that you and Serena aren’t, like, in love, why do you want to go on with the wedding?”

Dan exhales, puts his head in his hands. He says, through his fingers, “She and I are, at least, on the same page about it. We don’t have what we used to in high school, and maybe we never will. But it’s fine, because we’ve made our peace with it.”

“That makes no sense,” Jenny says, firmly, but ensuring it doesn’t sound like an accusation. “So you’re both just going to be sad and heartbroken together? Just, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, make each other miserable? And then wake up every morning, and do it again?”

“At least there’s certainty,” Dan says. He sounds shattered, Jenny thinks. “At least I know she’ll always be there, and she knows I’ll always be there. At least I’ll never wake up in the morning worried that the person that I love no longer loves me, that they’ve moved on from me, whatever. We’re not going to break each other’s hearts. I’m never going to wake up feeling like something ended, because we both know where we really are. Serena and I have seen each other at our absolute worst, broken each other’s hearts before, all of it. There’s no hurt or damage that we haven’t caused each other, so really, it’s the safest course of action.”

“You’re not supposed to marry someone for safety measures, Dan,” Jenny says, aghast. “She’s your future wife. She’s not a lifejacket, or an ambulance. You’re supposed to marry someone who you love.”

Dan sighs. “You’re making this sound a lot worse than it is.”

“Maybe,” Jenny allows. “But the real question is, why won’t you and Serena let yourselves be happy? Don’t you think you both deserve real love? Don’t you think Serena deserves better than you, Dan?”

Dan looks at her. He looks a little lost, in some way.

“I don’t mean that in a classist way, you _know_ that,” Jenny says, gently, carefully. “I know you’ve spent your whole life hearing it. I just mean, Serena deserves a shot at real love and happiness. So do you. And if you both aren’t going to have it together, maybe you’ve accepted that you’re going to spend your whole life lonely and unloved. But is that what you want for Serena?”

“No, of course not,” Dan says, visibly upset. “She’s my best friend, you know that. I care about her, and I want her to be happy.”

“Talk to her,” Jenny says. “It’s not too late to call off the wedding.”

“But we’ve spent so much time, and money, and I don’t want it to be a waste,” Dan says quietly.

“It’ll be more of a waste if you go through with it, end up hating each other, and needing to get divorced and split financial assets,” Jenny says. “Talk to Serena. Tell her everything. Tell her that you want her to be happy, ask her why she’s settling for you. Tell her you’ll still be her best friend even if the wedding’s off, in case that’s what she’s worried about. Tell her you’re sorry for hurting her. Ask her what she wants, how she feels, how you can help. Tell her that you don’t think marriage is a solution, or a good way forward, if all the two of you are going to be doing is hurting each other.”

Dan nods, eventually. He still looks really lost, and so Jenny shifts, walks over to him, gives him a hug. He doesn’t seem to be expecting it – Jenny thinks he was geared for a fight, and the fact that he doesn’t have to deal with a fight is probably throwing him off at least a little. Eventually, he shifts, hugs her back.

“I feel like I’m a terrible person,” Dan says. “I don’t deserve anyone’s forgiveness.”

“We’ve all made mistakes,” Jenny says, quiet. “I know that better than anyone else. All that matters is that you make amends. Okay?”

Dan nods, pressing his face into Jenny’s shoulder. Jenny sits down next to him, just holds him, wonders if this is what being an elder sibling is like. After a few minutes of this, Dan takes a deep breath, and moves away.

“Do you think we could do something? Like, watch a movie?” he asks, quietly.

“Yeah,” Jenny says. “Of course. What d’you wanna watch?”

*

A few Disney movies later (childhood classics, truly), Dan says he’ll apologise, says he thinks Serena has a license to hate him forever now.

He’s blaming himself a lot, which is good, because it is his fault and at least he knows that, Jenny thinks. But it’s also bad, because it’s not particularly productive. Plus, it’s not _entirely_ his fault.

She tells him this, tells him that feeling bad isn’t going to fix a damn thing. “You need to talk to Serena, tell her you’re sorry, ask her how you can make it up to her,” Jenny says. “And you need to call off the wedding. And you need to be honest with Nate, too.”

“Nate?” Dan asks, eyes wide.

“Dan, come on,” Jenny says. “You owe him that much. You already broke Serena’s heart, don’t do the same to him.”

Dan looks more confused than Jenny’s ever seen him. “Do you think… he really…. what…”

Jenny frowns. “If you have questions, I think you need to talk to Nate.”

Dan bites his lip. “We both do need to apologise to Serena, as well.”

Jenny sighs. Beyond a point, she cannot fix other people’s problems. What’s more, she’s not going to.

“Go call Nate,” Jenny says. “Talk to him, but remember: think with your head, not with your dick.”

“Ouch,” Dan says, but it makes him smile, so Jenny considers it a win. “No bigger evil than little sisters, huh?”

“Don’t you know it,” Jenny agrees.

*

Dan and Serena do call the wedding off, ultimately. Dan and Serena spend a whole day just sitting and talking, and at the end of it, as Jenny watches, they hug once, firmly, and then part ways.

“How’re you managing living arrangements?” Jenny asks Dan.

Dan shrugs. “I’m moving in with Nate, and Blair’s moving in with Serena.”

“And it’s all okay?” Jenny asks.

“It’s all fine,” Dan says. “Serena’s too good a person, in every possible way.”

Just in case, Jenny checks this out with Serena, too.

“Blair needs somewhere to stay, she’s been living in a hotel for a bit,” Serena says. “And Dan and Nate… well… I’ll be honest, it still hurts. I don’t expect that to stop hurting anytime soon. But I want to be the bigger person, you know? It helps that they both feel terrible about it.”

“They’d better, or I’ll go yell at them again,” Jenny says, taking one of Serena’s hands and squeezing it. “And, Serena? I know the wedding’s off, but you’ll always be like a sister to me, anyway.”

“ _Knew_ you were the best Humphrey,” Serena says. “I called it months ago.”

“It should be common knowledge by now,” Jenny agrees.

*

Blair and Jenny go to get coffee together. Blair looks better than she’s looked in a while – she’s cut her hair a little, so it’s shorter than shoulder length but only a little, and she’s winged her eyeliner and is wearing a vibrant red matte lipstick. She’s wearing bold green, and she looks lovely.

Jenny, conversely, braided her hair at a red light on the drive there, and it probably shows. She’d also borrowed one of Serena’s shirts and Eric’s skinny jeans, because it felt better. Like that Mayday Parade lyric from a song that Dan had listened to on repeat while he was trying to write some angsty short fiction – _wearing your clothes just to know that I’m home._

“How’s it going?” Jenny asks. “Proceeding according to plan?”

“I was always more powerful than that man,” Blair says, nodding. She breaks the solemn air, and smiles happily. “It’s going perfectly, Jen.”

They sit there for a while, drinking coffees. Jenny’s aware of Blair’s eyes on her, watching her and waiting.

“So, no Dan and Serena wedding,” Jenny says.

“No Dan and Serena wedding,” Blair agrees.

“What about us?” Jenny asks, quiet.

“If Dan and Serena didn’t last, who’s to say any of us will?” Blair asks, quiet. “What’s the guarantee, Jenny?”

“Well. I’m not Dan, and you’re not Serena,” Jenny says, seriously. “Also, Dan and Serena aren’t mythology, Blair. They’re just people. People aren’t infallible.”

“What if one of us hurts the other one irreparably badly?” Blair asks.

“Haven’t you already?” Jenny asks. She raises her coffee like it’s a champagne glass. “I’m still here.”

“I don’t want to be that girl again.”

“You won’t, Blair,” Jenny says. She looks at Blair, and Blair looks back. “We’ve both changed enough that neither of us will be those people again. I think, if you want to be with me, we have a real chance. I can’t promise I’ll never fuck up, but I can promise to do my best not to fuck up, and I’m promising that right now. And I know you, I trust you, I believe you can do the same, if you really want.”

Jenny exhales. “I’m not scared of you. I’m not a pawn on your chessboard anymore.”

“You’re my queen,” Blair says. And it’s not the first time she’s said this, but the way she says it makes it feel like the first time. “Jenny, you _are_.”

Jenny rolls her eyes, but smiles. “So… there is an us?”

“There is an us,” Blair agrees. “You’re okay with being my girlfriend, I’m presuming? Or would you rather I use a different term, or – ”

“Girlfriend is fine,” Jenny says, and she smiles. “Finally! Gosh. Nate and Serena have been breathing down my neck over this.”

“Oh?” Blair asks, raising an eyebrow. “Nate’s been encouraging it on my end, too. It’s been a while since Serena and I really had a heart to heart properly, like that, one that wasn’t about Chuck, you know? But I’m living with her now, so I’m hoping we can bridge that distance.”

“I’m sure you can,” Jenny says. “She loves you a lot, you know.”

“Clearly she’s not the only one,” Blair says, teasingly.

Jenny rolls her eyes again. “Why, are you surprised by that?”

Blair smiles. “No, not surprised. Just grateful.”

Jenny looks at Blair; really looks at Blair, at the way Blair is sitting across her, posture confident, a small smile on her face, make-up perfectly in place, how real the moment feels, how _solid._

“I’m grateful too,” Jenny says. She has never meant anything more.

**Author's Note:**

> can you believe we're done? me neither. hope this lived up to the hype!!


End file.
